What's It All about, Andy?

There's something else I noticed in tSR (The Shawshank Redemption). The "what it's all about" scene.

In films with a strong, driven protagonist, there is often a scene near the end of act two where the protagonist reveals why they are driven to do what they do.

In "Rocky," just before the big fight, Rocky climbs into bed with Adrian and says, "The only thing I wanna do is go the distance. If I go them fifteen rounds, an' that bell rings an' I'm still standin', I'm gonna know then I weren't just another bum from the neighborhood."

In "The Silence of the Lambs," Hannibal interrogates Clarice from his cage and learns that Clarice sometimes wakes up in the dark with the lambs screaming and that maybe if she can save poor Catherine, she can make them stop.

In tSR, on his final day in prison, Andy Dufresne tells Red that "I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living or get busy dying."

It's simple and subtle but I think it's the same principle. This kind of scene works for this kind of character.

Putting it another way, if you're a writer and your protagonist is a driven character like Rocky or Clarice, consider adding a "what it's all about" scene around the second plot point.